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East Orange is not affluent by any stretch of the imagination. Seven Oaks in Orange is nice but because its Orange prices are not even that high. Quite honestly, id group them with Irvington and newark. Though in reality its all newark and newark just spilled over and its problems spread and hit East Orange, Orange, Irvington and as it continued to spread it hit lower parts of nice towns.

Actually, yes there are parts of East Orange that are affluent. The neighborhoods around Tremont ave. going toward South Orange, and the area that borders Bloomfield are definitely so.

It's funny b/c I literally had this same argument before w/ him (coworker) not realizing the streets I mentioned were actually in East Orange.

i don't know if i equate snobby with nasty. flaunting wealth and acting better than others because of you're financial status is what i see as snobby i guess. and at my school, the folks from bergan county had their noses up in the air.

not saying this is a fair assessment, but i have friends from other parts of NJ that view bergan county that way as well.

it's my own fault for making an assumption based on limited info. i think bergen county is beautiful and looked around there for a house. i'd have to meet more real people from there and less people that went to my school. my school was more or less a subset of snobs anyhow.

What I mean as snobby is the condescending arrogance, nastiness and fancing oneself higher than others of lower financial status and thus regularly belittling them with the "my house is bigger than yours" mentality. Many of them behave quite badly, in public places. I remember there was a fight in front of an ice freezer at the Pathmark in Morganville between two 40 year old men who happened to get there at the same time and physically fought over who was going to get their ice first. The police even showed up! I grew up in Manalapan, the next town over, which had many of the same elements. I left the area when I was away at college, and then again last year now that I'm on my own. I have family all over the state as well. So I have either lived or spent quality time in various places throughout the state, and I can accurately say that the area I grew up in is like no other place I've ever been to, in my life, and now having lived there and left the area, it is definitely the last place in New Jersey that I would want to live.

I'm sure there are snob elements in Bergen and Essex Counties without question, I'm sure there are. I've just never encountered them. I haven't spent much time in the most affluent areas in both counties. I'm most familiar with Montclair and the vicinity around the Meadowlands, and the malls in Paramus.

I live in Middlesex County now, and the most affluent places like East Brunswick and Highland Park have their share of snobbery, but I know many people in my area who have said everyone they ever met from Monmouth County was very "stuck up". And those were their exact words, "stuck up". I fully agree.

West Orange is the affluent one. And South Orange is OK, it's where Seton Hall is. East Orange used to be very affluent, I've heard many stories about how that place thrived more than 40 years ago, but all those big houses were either knocked down or converted into multiple families as the Newark elements spread in. The same type of thing is currently happening in Mercer County. Every town bordering Trenton is slowly becoming an extension of it. Orange I never hear anything about, but probably because it's the smallest and thus seems basically like an extension of East Orange.

Bergen County has traffic along the highways. Essex gets nasty on the Parkway, and on those backroads through places like Glen Ridge during rush hour.

South Orange is largely affluent on the hills (very large homes), a big part of the town (Especially going toward Livingston). West Orange is nice on the hills, but it's lower valley can be a bit worn.

What I mean as snobby is the condescending arrogance, nastiness and fancing oneself higher than others of lower financial status and thus regularly belittling them with the "my house is bigger than yours" mentality. Many of them behave quite badly, in public places. I remember there was a fight in front of an ice freezer at the Pathmark in Morganville between two 40 year old men who happened to get there at the same time and physically fought over who was going to get their ice first. The police even showed up! I grew up in Manalapan, the next town over, which had many of the same elements. I left the area when I was away at college, and then again last year now that I'm on my own. I have family all over the state as well. So I have either lived or spent quality time in various places throughout the state, and I can accurately say that the area I grew up in is like no other place I've ever been to, in my life, and now having lived there and left the area, it is definitely the last place in New Jersey that I would want to live.

I'm sure there are snob elements in Bergen and Essex Counties without question, I'm sure there are. I've just never encountered them. I haven't spent much time in the most affluent areas in both counties. I'm most familiar with Montclair and the vicinity around the Meadowlands, and the malls in Paramus.

I live in Middlesex County now, and the most affluent places like East Brunswick and Highland Park have their share of snobbery, but I know many people in my area who have said everyone they ever met from Monmouth County was very "stuck up". And those were their exact words, "stuck up". I fully agree.

that's a shame. manalapan has always struck me as a nice place. i don't know anyone from there though. it probably is more town by town. and i admit that my judgment is based on a limited population of snobby kids at a snobby college. but when i moved here after college, i still got that same feeling from people here, so just gave credence to the opinion without really directly knowing it. of course, it's not fair to paint the whole county that way. but it is interesting when i talk to my NJ friends and they say bergen is the only county where people say they are from xyz county. dunno if that's true, but it has been in my experience. i'm learning more about NJ every day though hahaha.

South Orange is largely affluent on the hills (very large homes), a big part of the town (Especially going toward Livingston). West Orange is nice on the hills, but it's lower valley can be a bit worn.

Yes, the Newstead area of South Orange is very affluent, with a lot of old money.

What Zhelder said in his post is pretty much right on, but I would add a couple things...

The thing that is weird to me about Essex that I don't see in Bergen is that in their supposedly "nice" or "affluent" neighborhoods/towns you will come across bizarrely misplaced buildings and structures. For example, in the midst of homes, you will come across a small corporate office, or some kind of weird tower for power lines or phone, or some other such structure. It seems they have no problem building nice homes amongst such things. In Bergen County, it seems that great measures are taken to keep residential areas separate from such structures, especially in the "nice" or "affluent" areas.

Also, it seems to me that the people in the more affluent sections of Essex County are way more snooty and tend to project their snootiness. It's ironic because they also tend to live within several miles of a crime-ridden ghetto yet they are so prideful of their "affluent suburb". Bergen County has its share of snooty people but many here are also second+ generation and much more down to earth.

Oh, and the traffic in Essex is MUCH, much worse than it is in Bergen.

I disagree about the traffic. I work in Bergen but live in Western Essex County. You will not catch me near Route 4 or 17 on a Saturday especially with all the crazed NY drivers cutting accross 4 lanes a traffic to dart in and out of the store parking lots. There seem to be traffic jams even on the few Saturdays I've come into work in the afternoon. You generally only have traffic on 280 or the Parkway during the weekdays or on Saturdays in the summer.

Bergen county has less Transportation options , but has more ppl and in my opinion is more congested.

Bergen MORE congested than Essex?

I grew up in Bergen County. We had pet chickens in the backyard. The people behind us had horses.

OK, so people don't keep chickens in the new suburbia anymore, but I think there are a heck of a lot more trees and open space in Franklin Lakes or Ridgewood than in Bloomfield or Belleville. And Bergen has nothing anywhere near a Newark as far as urban-ness goes.

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